Challenge #00859-B128: Abominations of Nurture
I need to show [Person] how to repair things properly. Their first instinct is still to reach for a roll of [duct tape]. I just hope I’m not too late. Power corrupts, but the power of duct tape corrupts absolutely.
“Trigellis is a Spark. And Sparks should never be raised in the Holy order of JOATs. Things go… very wrong.”
“For example,” Pletherly drew the curtains to reveal a contained lab. Where a Spark, presumably Trigellis, was busy piloting a machine apparently made of duct tape and paperclips… and nothing else.
“Yes. I’m going to try and show him the advantages of gears and pistons… but he may be too far gone.” Aukney produced the one key to the lab. “Do prepare the -ah- advanced C-gas?”
“Of course,” Pleatherly bowed.
Therapy time had begun.
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Come up to the lab, see what’s on the slab…
A Frankenstein-esque mad scientist (re)creates life from parts of the dead, and one of the first responses from his new (female) creation is an exploratory grope and a frustrated…
“Dammit, you could’ve at least tried to get a matching pair…”
(#00858-B127)
“What? They aren’t the same size? But the clothing label on your donor said D cup…”
“This one is a thirty-five D,” explained the monster, juggling a bosom. “This one is a thirty D. The cup size changes depending on the chest circumference.”
“Um,” said VanQuiche. “Oops?”
“Um. Oops. Um, oops? That’s all you have for me? You are marching right back to that donor pool and finding me a matching set of boobs this instant, mister!”
There was nothing else to say, but, “Yes’m.”
“And did you even try to do neat needlework? This is my face! People have to look at it!“
“I’llgetrightonthat, Iswear.”
“And how the hell did you give me such a narrow waist? Did you scrimp on the internal organs?”
“Uuuuuuuuummmmm…” VanQuiche retreated for the door. “I’ll make sure you have a complete set… shall I?”
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Challenge #00857-B126: Wake up and Smell the Progress
‘We had a perfectly good slow rolling apocalypse going on before you decided to get involved, you know.’ they said, after a long pause.
‘Now you have a fast apocalypse. Rejoice; progress has come to you.’
She didn’t struggle very hard when they dragged her down into the catacombs. And she really shouldn’t have been surprised that all the members of the Secret Cabal were all chairmembers of various Big Corporate Entities.
“Lord Monsando. Does this belong to you?”
“Whatever are you Insinuating, Lord Dau? That’s not one of mine.”
All eyes turned towards Bee Pi. Who said, “Who? Me?”
“Explain yourself,” menaced Lord Disley.
“I knew I wouldn’t get your attention by trying to stop you,” said Agness. She let the cold fires of fury keep her calm. She was exactly where she wanted to be. “Everyone’s already doing that. So I decided to help.”
“Your ‘help’ was unnecessary,” iced Lord Eckson. “We had a lovely Frog Soup Apocalypse going on. Very profitable.”
“And now it’s headed away in the handbasket so much faster,” Agness grinned, and activated the little device on her belt. On its own, it wouldn’t attract the notice of any of the goons who checked her for weapons. But now that it was active? It turned her entire, significant body mass into a fission bomb. “And now the entire world will be able to stop it because they will notice.”
They stared at her as the machine warmed up. “How are you going to make money off of that?”
“Who said I wanted to make money?” said Agness. She had just enough time to savour the looks on their piggy faces before the entire Cabal died in white fire.
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Challenge #00856-B125: Just… Don’t Ask
I’d ask what else could go wrong, but I think I’ve got quite enough happening as it is, thank you.
“Awright… awright…” the entity calling herself Shayde seemed to be having difficulty with the sugar-coated and softened information they had just told her. “I can deal wi’ this. I can… I can deal wi’ this. Wee bitty bits. Aye. Deal wi’ it in wee bitty bits.”
The attending medtechs were watching her vital signs like hawks. As was Rael. Her heart rate was safely within panic realms, as was her adrenaline.
“I’m no’ on Earth, aye…”
Rael bit his tongue to stop himself echoing her ‘aye’. “Correct,” he said.
“I’m no’ in me own time…”
“Correct again.“
“It’s been five hundred years.”
“To our best estimates. Give or take a few decades.”
Redline panic. “How many is a few?” she wailed. And she wailed it in ancient Welsh.
“No more than three.” He elected not to tell her that the error was more likely to be on the ‘give’ side, and that the Galactic Standard Calendar had a really bizarre definition of ‘year’.
The entity known as Shayde got up and paced. “Plus or minus thirty years, what the fook…“ She flipped back to pre-shattering English. “I’m miles from Earth, aye?”
“Aye.” Damn it. “I mean, yes. You are.”
There was a soft sound and a flash of light, and the other entity of trouble incarnate was suddenly sharing the room. “I’m growing impatient.”
“Aw fook off, Loki!” Shayde threw something at him. The entity known as Loki vanished before her missile had a chance to connect. “Great. Jus’ fookain great. I’d ask what else can go wrong, but I reckon I got more’n enough on me plate.”
“Correct again,” said Rael. “And for the record, probability analysts have determined that the Universe really hates the people who ask that kind of question.”
This instantly derailed her panic. “…oooh, can I look at the math?”
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Challenge #00855-B124: One Dark and Stormy Evening in an Abandoned Subterranean Clank Lab
“Listen carefully,” they said. “This is absolutely true and not at all a desperate lie.”
Click-clack-clunk. “Previous data indicates that the organic will now lie. Subject… asks… that you do not.”
The human invader paused. “All right. Fine. I don’t want to be trapped in here.”
“Neither do I,” said Subject. “Subject wants… I need… my creator.“
Now the human narrowed their eyes. “You’re not the average clank… are you?”
Subject looked down at the floor. “Mama could not make children the organic way. So she made me.” At this point, she took out a locket and opened it to the faded image. “She went upstairs and has not come back.”
The human spent a long time looking at the image and humming to themselves. It was almost like Mama used to hum. Subject knew that sound, she knew that look. And that was why she gathered all the tools and parts she could.
“Can… you help?” asked Subject.
“Your… ‘mama’… may not return. But I can help you,” said the human. “I’m Agatha Heterodyne… and I’m sure you can help me when I’m done helping you.”
Oh goodie. Repairs at last!
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Challenge #00854-B123: Ahead by a Nose
Child: Mommy! Mommy! I found a head! Can I keep it?
Mum: No, you can’t keep it. Now go and give it back to the gentlebot who lost it.
Child: They didn’t say “thank you”, Mommy.
Mum: Don’t worry about it, dear. Some people don’t know how to be polite after they’ve been decapitated.
[AN: We all know the gentlebots of steampoweredgiraffe are well-mannered enough thank peeps who help when they’ve lost their heads, so…]
5PY-80T knew hir assignment. All ze had to do was arrange to get hir head into the enemy labs. Which required help from the mole.
They were supposed to meet at an anonymous park and exchange heads. 5PY-80T‘s facial plates were common enough with M0L3′s that the scanners wouldn’t tell the difference. The problem was… the contact was late.
Maybe it was the abundance of people with cameras. Maybe it was the increase in the local police force. Someone, somewhere, had stirred up trouble.
Desperate, 5PY-80T his hir head in the designated place and sent hir body over to a decent hiding place to await M0L3′s signal. And it should have gone well.
If it wasn’t for the small child.
Small children and animals had a knack for messing up plans. And this one found 5PY-80T‘s head and dutifully returned it to hir.
Maybe that was what had happened to M0L3…
5PY-80T lurked in the shadows, checking the wifi for messages or hints of what had gone wrong.
All this trouble, so hir mother-company could keep ahead in the game…
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Challenge #00853-B122: Summons in Trouble
“…‘and thus do we condem the acts of the malevolent…’? Wait… MALEVOLENT? How dare they call me ‘malevolent’!”
“Yeah, if anything, you’re just incompetent.”
“…Of course, I – hey, who’s side are you on, anyway?!”
“Yours, of course, Master… but even you must admit that your experiments are… a little lacking.”
“Of course they are - they’re experiments. They exist so that I know what to do better next time.”
“But the cogniscent cheese, sir…”
“What? I thought Horace was rather cute.”
“The villagers didn’t.”
“Pfah. Peasants. What do they know?”
“Apparently,” Igor peered at the paperwork, “the summoning of Tril’bii Mi’so and sundry other legal entities.”
At last, the master grew pale. “You mean…”
“Yes. A class action lawsuit.”
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Challenge #00852-B121: Catching Up
Ok If I’ve timed this right it ought to be just after eurovision.
Your prompt today is whatever act won.
[AN: You got it right. I’m willing to bet you were expecting something like Gay Disco Dracula though]
Shayde called it ‘degaussing’ when she didn’t call it “Catching up wi’ five hundred years o’ Tivo” and it usually involved a bucket of popcorn. Buttered, of course.
“So what are you binging on, tonight?”
“Eurovision.”
Her answers always surprised him. Humans displaced in time generally caught up with soap operas or teledramas. Shayde was, as always, different. “Enlighten me. This is an Earth custom?”
“Oh aye. Europe get together to see who sings the best and then gets in a snip aboot who really does. England loses. Always.”
“Ah.” Terrans. They found endless ways to pick a fight with each other. He sat by her on the couch. “What are you up to?”
“Twenty-fifteen.” She offered some popcorn. “The year - fer no reason, ye ken - they let Australia play.”
“Australia. Great southern land. Opposite end of the globe. Not Europe at all?”
“Aye,” Shayde munched on her handful. “I think they did it tae piss off the States.”
“Probably,” allowed Rael. He watched in confusion. “I thought this contest was a celebration of costume and spectacle.”
“They toned it down for the noobs, I reckon.”
“That’s it? Laser projection and flashy lights?”
“And a catchy song that’s ninety percent chorus, aye.”
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Challenge #00851-B120: One Fine Evening at a Galactic Mixer Party
Between two cultures, the body language and customs for aggression/anger in one are very similar to the flirting/courtship of the other.
In this scenario: A series of attempts to get an individual to agree to a date are taken entirely the wrong way.
She shouldn’t have gone amongst the Deathworlders. She could already feel her mortality creeping up on her. Havenworlders and Deathworlders never mixed well.
“Pretty,” said one of the Deathworlders. A tall beast with entirely too much hair and sharp, efficient-looking teeth. It looked… hungry.
“I am not edible,” she lied.
“Dunno. You look pretty delicious to me.” More bared teeth. “I won’t bite. Unless you want me to.”
Ryll shrieked and ran away.
When she offered up the complaint at her districts’ security kiosk, they carefully and repeatedly explained that the human in question was trying to flirt with her.
Deathworlders… they were so baffling.
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Challenge #00850-B119: One Fine Bar Fight at a Galactic Crossroads
Between two cultures, the body language and customs for aggression/anger in one are very similar to the flirting/courtship of the other.
In this scenario: An aggressive display is mistaken for flirting.
She got into the human’s personal space. Closed her off from any escape. Rumbled in a low threat, “I like your face.”
The human bared her teeth and uttered a barking call. Then she pressed her rubbery mouth to Hoq’a’lu’gi’s face. “I think you’re cute, too.“
Her ship-companions were correct. It was very hard to start a fight with a human.
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